NEEMANN turns 133 – today!
On the occasion of the 75th anniversary, Curt Neemann said in his speech (Curt Neemann is Cord Neemann’s grandfather and at the same time Meinhard’s son and Meinhard’s father!. All right?! Easier: Pütje I, II, III and IV)
“On August 7, 1889, my father, the bookseller Meinhard Neemann, had his newly founded company entered in the commercial register at the district court in Leer.
In addition to a printing works and a newspaper publishing house, the intention was to primarily start the production of bags and pouches, which at that time were still mostly made by hand.
The time when bag spinning was still part of the training for apprentices in the colonial goods retail trade was coming to an end. This bag turning required a very high degree of skill.
From a simple sheet of paper or newspaper – one will not have taken it that precisely – a bag was so artistically turned, that is to say: at that time one still said “Dü t e”, that a firm wrapping was created without the use of any glue, in flour, sugar, semolina, coffee, tea, etc. could be packaged and transported reasonably safely.”
[…]
The company founder started with manual work in an attic in the house at Neue Straße 46. However, after only five years (1894) the business was run in the packing house of the former Hotel Voigt on Neue Straße. There were already two bottom bag machines here, one of which produced the tube and the other the bottom. In 1897 a new bottom bag machine and two pointed bag machines were set up, followed in 1898 by the first gusseted bag machine and another bottom bag machine. A remarkable start to mechanization! By the turn of the 20th century, Voigt’s Hotel’s packing house had become too small. The M. Neemann company moved to a newly built factory on Deichstrasse, in a building that was impressive for what was then Leer.
[…]
Originally, consumers in East Friesland and its immediate vicinity were supplied. However, the constantly growing production required a larger sales area. Branches in: Dortmund, Frankfurt am Main and Königsberg were founded. Not as a branch of production, but only as a sales base. I would particularly like to point out that all three places were easy to reach by water. […] For this reason, up to the start of the Second World War, more than 90% of all deliveries were shipped by water.”
This was the first chapter in a small series on the history of the company.
The story of M. NEEMANN in the sense of a complete and true story cannot exist: the development of a company over 133 years is closely intertwined with the respective political, social, economic and technical framework conditions.
Who is able to grasp everything and finally judge how it affected NEEMANN and vice versa?! In addition, hundreds of employees, several shareholders and a number of other “stakeholders” could express their own point of view and contribute important information – but even if that were possible, the picture would remain incomplete.
Since the following is a subjective account, I would first like to identify myself as the narrator. My name is Cord Neemann, born in 1972 as the great-grandson of company founder Meinhard Neemann. Above all, I will let my ancestors tell the story themselves, but I take the liberty of selecting the sources and occasionally adding to them and commenting on them.
